How many bigs will play meaningful minutes

[oldhusky]

I think in terms of the number of bigs in the rotation, the answer is 3, 4 or 5 and I'm not trying to be a wise ass with that comment. There are circumstances for all three of those. My best guess is a traditional 2 big lineup with Sarah and Serah starting, and Ice and Jana backing them up, I think that would be ideal, but Ice in particular is not a lock in my opinion, and has more potential challengers, and I think she will be used more as a 4 this year.

She could be challenged in several ways, by Ayanna at the same position (4), by a guard in small ball, or even by Jana playing more at the 5 with Serah playing the 4 alongside her. Remember Geno used a three big rotation a few years ago with Liv, Dorka and Aaliyah. My point is the 4th big has to be close to as good as the third big or Geno could go with just three,

As for the possibility of 5, that probably would only happen when Geno went even bigger with Sarah at the 3, Serah at the 4 and occasionally Gandy at the 5 but Jana getting most of the minutes there.

We can go big or small, not because we have to from injuries, but because Geno wants to. With depth and versatility, every body in the rotation will have to clear a pretty big hurdle. Being the second best player at your natural position doesn't mean you are in if Geno could use a better player that is bigger or smaller instead.

I still hope the rotation will be a full 10.

 

[Plebe]

That wasn't my point. Read more carefully. I merely said that they tend not to do that, not that they won't or haven't.

But that's just inaccurate. All the players are voted on independently, the ballots are tallied, and the teams are named in rank order of the overall voting tally. There's no “tendency” to award only X number of spots to front or back court players.

To circle back to Serah, although she isn't competing with any specific opposing players more than others, it seems doubtful that her offensive output would be close to her level at Wisconsin, given the array of offensive talent that she'll (hopefully) be surrounded by. Not to mention the need to habituate rapidly to Geno's system, a process that has somehow proven difficult with previous transfer posts. But who knows, we'll see.

 

[Stagnant]

Williams and Strong. And Jana and Ice are competing for minutes.

I am sure we will again have some small ball lineups that we like.

 

[Molisanos]

I agree with your main point, that Geno will be able to put a lot of big kids on the floor without sacrificing speed or versatility. But this little factoid has been taking up way too much of my mental time for the last few months.

FIBA and Eurobasket are usually pretty careful about such details. The earliest measurements I could find listed her at 182cm or ~6’. Other (perhaps later) measurements had her at 186cm or 6’1 1/4”. Yet other measurements (perhaps even later?) showed her to be 188cm or 6’2”.

In her regular season games which were with the pros she didn’t look all that big, maybe 6’1”. But in the final tournament where it was just the high school kids she looked very big, like at least 6’2”.

I don’t think this really matters much. What we care about is ‘how big she plays.’ Sarah plays much bigger than her 190cm, just like her mom did. Blanca has long limbs but isn’t slight. She doesn’t shrink from going up against taller players. I suspect she’ll seem plenty big to us and to all the opposing teams. Size only matters if it’s mobile, and Blanca is quick if she’s anything.

Blanca is 188 cm tall, and no one is counting out her chances of playing power forward, where she’s pretty much unstoppable. But with all the players on the roster, I think we’ll see more of Blanca in the 2026/2027 season.

 

[Cuango]

To me, Serah's best chance to land on the AP teams was this past year when her stats were awesome-She averaged 19.2 pts per game. 9.8 rebounds had an efficiency of 22.7 and 3.0 Win Shares. With both Sarah and Azzi as our dynamic duo, it will be hard for Serah to warrant inclusion simply because there are so many good players now. Betts, Hidalgo, Latson, Miles, Booker, Blakes, Flau'jae Johnson, Crooks, Beers, Edwards all garnered votes last year. Add in Strack, Kneepkens now on UCLA and Kimora Johnson at Virginia and you have a stacked list of names. Even if UConn is totally dominant, there simply are too many other notable players to say Serah will get vots over. UCLA will be loaded with Betts, Rice, Kneepkens and Leger-Walker. SCar will have Edwards and Latson plus a Ashley Watkins and Chloe Kitts. LSU will have Johnson, Fulwiley, Koval and Williams. Texas will have Booker, Harmon, Oldacre and Breya Cunningham. Heck even hated Tennessee will have Cooper who will put up gaudy stats.

To me, the playing field is just way too crowded to think UConn could land 3 players on the top 15, never mind the top 10. Plus our history of fully incorporating an experienced "Big" into our scheme is not the best (See Azura Stephens, Natalie Butler, Dorka Juhasz) as we are a high post team. Geno will not be changing his philosophy which has won him 12 tittles-that is just an absolute silly notion. His rotation will be deeper-maybe 10 now but the ball movement and passing will still be integral.

All true and yet it will still come down to how well Serah plays. I see her being somewhere between solid and great for us. I suppose that would look like 15 & 7-20 & 10? I would not be surprised with anything within that range and I also believe either extreme of that range will be plenty good enough to set us up nicely for a chance to repeat. I get no sense that her production is going to be curtailed by the step up in competition as I believe Geno and CD will have her well prepared by the time November comes around.
She is clearly a stud and seems to be confident and eager to show the coaches (and the fans) that she is on a mission to finish out her career as a champion! I truly think she’s going to be a major factor and it will not surprise me in the least if she contends for AA status as I believe she came to UConn for a purpose. If she puts up anything close to 20 & 10 she should be a lock for AA and our odds of repeating will be looking good as well!